Well, it looks like McCain decided he had gotten the bailout talks in hand and he decided to go to the debate after all, thus clearing the way for his running mate Sarah Palin to have her own debate with Joe Biden next Thursday (can't wait for that one)!
You know I'm biased, but I have to say I thought McCain was unusually snarky and belittling of Obama, completely refusing to look him in the eye. But what really struck me was when he gave Obama the "I don't need on the job training" shot, which immediately made me think of his running mate Barbie. Does he think she could have come anywhere close to making the kind of points Obama made? It should be clear to everyone by now that he chose her because he thought she would help him win the election, not because she could help him govern. Obama, on the other hand, chose the best person to help him govern, or even take over in the unfortunate event something happens to him. And that says a lot about the two men to me.
But back to the debate... I think both men got in some punches, and while I would have liked to hear more specifics about some things I think it's hard to do that in a debate where there is limited time without running the danger of getting bogged down in minutiae. I also noticed that McCain falls into the Chris Matthews trap of referring to historical events and people that a lot of younger voters (who will play a big part in this election) don't know or care about. Obama tried to be magnanimous by saying a couple of times that "John is right..." when he should have said something like "while x did happen, it would have been better if we had done y", but in any case he showed more respect for McCain than McCain did for him.
Now on to next Thursday. If Palin's handlers once again allow her to say that she has foreign policy experience because you can see an island off the coast of Russia from an island off the coast of Alaska, especially when debating the foreign policy expert in the Senate, all that will be left to do is for the Obamas to start packing for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
